Lost Memories
by Alpha-to-Omega
Summary: When the war is over and the world returns to normal, what will the children know?


A young girl raced up the castle steps, her face shining with excitement. "Look, look what I found!" She exclaimed, holding up a tarnished and battered scrap of metal. Her friends rolled their eyes but dutifully went to look at what she was holding. When they got a good look at it however, their eyes widened and they got even more excited than she was. "Do you know what that is?" The shorter boy gasped, his eyes doing a fairly good impression of a house elf's eyes. "It's one of the first extended shield charms! These are so rare, I bet it's worth tons of Galleons." The girl turned the scrap of metal around in her hands, looking closely at it. It seemed to be a badge of some sort with a phoenix engraved on it. She shook her head and glared at the shorter boy. "Thomas, if you think I am falling for another one of your stupid tricks you can just think again. Everyone knows extended shield charms are common. Why would an old and weak charm like this be worth any money?"   
The taller boy reached out and grabbed the stained and dented badge from her hand and spoke with a kind of friendly derision. "Because stupid, this might be one of the badges worn by the heroes of the Great War. Even if it wasn't, it was worn during the end of the Great War. Wouldn't you pay to have something one of them wore?" The girl looked at the ruined scrap of a badge with a new appreciation, a sort of wonder on her face. "You mean that this may be the badge of one of the people who helped to end the dark times? I could have found something that belonged to one of them?" The three children stared at the pitted and ruined hunk of metal with awe on their faces and a humble feeling in their hearts, thinking of the old stories they had learned as children. It had been nearly a century since that battle, but the memories lived on in legend.   
  
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Hermione Granger stood by the sides of her best friends, her hair as wild as ever and her voice softly reciting curses under her breath. Ron and Harry exchanged a rueful glance over her head, each remembering a similar scene when they were but first years, small and terrified and so alone. The three of them had come far since those days, but some things would never change. The sound of her voice filled them with a kind of peace, a reminder of days and years gone by when they were backed against the wall and yet somehow managed to make it through. Each of them tightened their grips on their wands, Hermione also softly stroking the badges that they had been gifted with. Fred and George had made the badges, and that was a reason to trust them in itself. The idea had been Hermione's however, an idea because of the Headless Hats. Hermione had worked with the twins after school hours to find a way to stretch a protective spell around a person, and these badges were the result of almost a year of hard work. Harry trusted the Weasley Twins, but he trusted Hermione more, and so he never touched his badge, fully confident that it would work.   
They stepped forward as one, eight years of constant and life threatening friendship giving them an almost telepathic understanding of each other. They cast their curses only a heartbeat apart, beams of light that arrowed to the wall of blackness that surrounded the last stronghold of the wizarding world. The tandem between the three of them was obvious and immediate, and from that alone they were known. There were no others who unthinkingly slipped into such an automatic harmony. They were at the forefront, leading a hopeless charge, and that too was what they knew.   
They had never sunk into the background, any of them. The boy who lived was only slightly more famous than his companions, and they were all almost equally dangerous. Ron seemed to be the most harmless one, but his years of playing chess had honed him into a wily and difficult opponent. Hermione was a genius, and was almost unstoppable with a wand in her hand. Harry had the benefit of his unshakable courage and his total belief in his friends, which lent him an almost suicidal bravery in the face of any odds.  
Coming behind them were Harry's students and friends, those of the D.A. and those who simply followed him out of love. They were all painfully young, mere children, but they stood strong while faced with evil. They all stood at the ready, all shooting curses at the robed figures that so outnumbered the small but valiant group. Ginny, Neville and Luna fought forward, trying in vain to create a protective shield around the three of them. Harry shook them off, pushing Ron and Hermione into the protective arms of their friends before striding forward alone. He sent curses flying forward almost randomly, saving only two figures from his vengeance. One slipped through the death eaters like a swift poison, killing swiftly and silently. The other stood there, horror twisting the mask he hid behind.   
Hermione was the first to free herself, the others being occupied with Ron's desperate struggle to get to Harry's side. She launched herself forward, reaching his side in moments even as she fired her spells with a deadly accuracy. She heard Ron scream for Harry, the pain in his voice raw and desperate, and turned just enough to see a beam so green it was almost black heading to him. She was already at Harry's side and inched forward, a slight, almost unnoticeable movement, but enough to put her in the direct path of the beam. She knew that no shield could hold against that beam, but she was not a quitter. She quit sending magical spells and instead poured all of her magic, all of her love, everything she was and could be into that little badge.   
The beam struck her hard enough to carry her off of her feet and to send her flying backwards. She hit the ground hard, digging a small line in the ground as she skidded backwards. She looked small and so delicate laying there with her eyes closed, and several students began to cry as they saw her face. She looked white and drawn, while surrounded by a bushy brown halo. Her face had always been alive and passionate, but now it just looked small and hurt. She coughed weakly and got to her feet, stumbling back to Harry's side. Ron broke free of the people holding him and met her halfway. They looked at each other, and a silent conversation passed between them in a matter of seconds.   
He helped her back to Harry's side as they each threw curses at the death eaters that were closing in, neither of them noticing that the force of the curse had twisted and melted Hermione's protective badge. Only Ron noticed when Hermione turned her head to the side for a second and spit out bright red blood. She turned back as soon as she had cleared her mouth and continued to shoot spells at the men closing in on them, sparing him a single wan smile that was stained with blood. The three of them stood together once more, trying to defy the odds again.   
  
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"Can you imagine being there? It must have been glorious!" The tall blonde boy said, his tone indicating a kind of blind adulation that only children are capable of. The shorter boy shuddered, his face looking horrified. "People were killed by the hundreds! How can that be glorious?" The girl stared at the badge, seemingly lost in the idea of times that had passed so long ago. "Can you imagine?" She breathed, her voice almost failing her as she tried to picture the scene. "Just over a hunderd, marching out to face over a thousand, marching to death and glory, marching for a reason! They believed in something, they believed in something they were willing to die for." The three of them were quiet for a few minutes, each of them trying to image being willing to die just to bring the others a little closer to something.  
  
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Screams were rare, one thing that Harry was grateful for. Avadra Kedavra was swift and usually painless, but Harry still felt something being torn out of him each time he used it. Still, if that meant one less time someone else would have to use the spell, Harry would use the spell until he could no longer hold his wand. He shot spell after spell into the black wall before him, wishing he could take a second to check on Hermione. When he had seen Hermione take that spell for him his heart had shattered and he had sent the spells flying fast and furious to keep his tears back. When he felt her and Ron rejoin him, it was as if he had a huge load lifted off of him.   
Harry shot a spell at a man who stood before him. He thought it could be Lucius Malfoy, but he wasn't sure. He was slightly concerned he hadn't seen Draco Malfoy yet, but he felt that he would see him soon. Hermione fell on him at the last second though, and he shot a different man. He thought it might be Avery, but again he wasn't sure. He glanced down at Hermione, only to see her struggling upright again, blood pooling at the corner of her mouth. He said softly as he watched his next spell hit home "Please, go to the back, let the mediwitches on duty fix you up." He felt more than saw her smile as she replied "I'm fine Harry, quit worrying." He heard the sound of her wiping her hand across her mouth and could imagine the blood spreading across her mouth in that backhanded motion. "Please Hermione, you need help!" He begged, knowing that he sounded neurotic but unable to stop himself. He couldn't stand losing one of them, not them. He had handled all the death life seemed to want to throw at him, but nothing could be cruel enough to take them.   
  
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The taller boy said sadly "You're right Keith, anything that could cause the hero of the war to commit suicide exactly one year after is something horrible, not glorious." The three of them sat down, almost as one, sitting on the same steps that had held so many before them, even the heroes that they were now mourning.   
  
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Hermione spat out blood again, feeling her lungs hitch as the motion drove the splinters of bone even deeper into her. She had taken a few mediwitch classes, and knew that nothing could be done for her. At least two of her ribs were shattered, with one driving spikes into her lungs, heart, and muscle. It was just too much damage for emergency mediwitches to handle. She knew that she would likely die, but she was determined to give her all.   
She resumed casting spells, a heartbeat's pause between each one to let her gather her breath and magic. Again the black green bolt launched itself at Harry, and again she threw herself in front of it, realizing too late that she jumped a second too soon. Ron saw her lunge and reached out to grab her, determined to stop her suicide plunge. Unfortunately, he held on to her just long enough for her to take the whole blow, her chest caving slightly from the pressure.   
Harry and Ron both collapsed to their knees, their friends swarming over them as a protective shield. Hermione placed one bloodstained hand on each of their cheeks, a smile lighting her face. "Thank you for loving me" She gasped, blood bubbling out of her mouth with each word. "Even if I was a Know-it-all, you both were there…" A large amount of blood came out of her mouth and she never finished speaking. Both boys however finished for her, in voices choked with tears and love. "for me, and you both gave me hope." The connection between them seemed to intensify with the knowledge that she was gone. They had both loved Hermione, in their own ways, and her loss filled them both with a horrible rage. They arose with bloody marks on their cheeks and a terrible mixture of grief and rage burning in their eyes. They never knew that her last thought was that she hoped they mattered in the years to come. 

  
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"Wow, they really made a difference, didn't they?" The girl said softly, tears welling in her eyes. She never knew the badge she found belonged to the smartest witch Hogwarts had ever seen, or that the girl who's badge she had found once loved two boys more than life itself. She did however know she lived in a good world, and that she owed it to the bravest people that history had ever known. 


End file.
